B.R. Myers

Why we are not foodies after all

Ever since the Atlantic Monthly published contributing editor B.R. Myers' screed ''The Moral Crusade Against Foodies'' in the March issue, insults and calumnies have been flying back and forth on the Web like mashed potatoes in a cafeteria food fight. The gist of Myers' argument is that to be a foodie is to be a glutton. When he insists that foodies have ''a littleness of soul,'' he reminds us of the New Yorker who went deer hunting in Maine, shot a farmer's cow, and pronounced that he preferred beef anyway. Myers picked some easy targets (Anthony Bourdain's ''oafishness,'' Michael Pollan's ''sanctimony'') and knocked them over—but so what? Even Bourdain, Pollan, et al. should be pleased. Myers' excoriation might even sell a few more books. We...Read More